


An Intelligent Mind Can Adapt

by Kalypso



Category: Blake's 7
Genre: Gen, Season/Series 04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1999-09-06
Updated: 1999-09-06
Packaged: 2017-12-30 08:46:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1016548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kalypso/pseuds/Kalypso
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Servalan's triumph at Gauda Prime is overturned in the last way she - or Avon - could have expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Intelligent Mind Can Adapt

**Author's Note:**

> This story was written for the Freedom City Birthday Party of 1999, when the theme was Something New. In 2000 it was published in _Varia Lectio_ , edited by Ellie B.

As the gunshots died away, Servalan advanced quietly into the tracking gallery. Avon stood over Blake's body, gun raised; the troops, obedient to her orders, encircled him, but held their fire. He was looking down at the face that lay still by his feet, its single eye gazing back at him, as if to ask why...

"Why, Avon?" she asked. "Why did you shoot him?"

"I didn't."

Denial was not something she had expected. "Your finger was on the trigger," she reminded him. "You killed him."

"I didn't, Servalan. But YOU did, didn't you?"

She was startled, for a moment, wondering if the shock of events had turned his mind. Surely not, not Avon... No, it was merely a compliment to her subtle planning of the trap that had given her all she wanted: Blake, dead, and Avon, alive, in her clutches... Then she saw that he was not looking at her, but at the unfamiliar snub-nosed gun in his hand.

"You killed Blake!" he cried at the weapon.

Disappointment flooded Servalan's mind. He was mad, after all, and her elaborate scheme had failed to claim its ultimate objective!

Then she knew that she was mad, or that the whole scene was some bizarre dream. For the gun answered back.

"Of course I did. Had I not done so, my prediction would have been inaccurate."

"Your prediction?" hissed Avon.

"I told you that Blake's trail ended on Gauda Prime. Had he been allowed to leave the planet, my prediction would have been invalidated."

The gun seemed irritated, and its voice was oddly familiar... it couldn't be... 

"Orac?" Servalan gasped.

Avon had not raised his accusing glare from the gun, but evidently heard her. "I was carrying Orac when we left the flyer," he growled. "Suddenly we got in here, Tarrant was running round shouting, Blake was falling down with three big holes in his stomach and I wasn't holding a computer but a fancy gun I've never seen in my life. What do you have to tell me, Orac?"

"Since practising molecular reduction through stabilised atomic implosion - at your request when we visited Freedom City - I have been studying methods of rearranging my atoms completely in order to perform other functions," explained Orac.

"Other functions?" murmured Avon menacingly.

"Indeed. One of my early attempts was a drinks dispenser; Vila unlocked me and had several glasses of adrenalin and soma without suspecting anything. I was already working on the possibilities of weaponry when you visited Malodaar. Had you not engaged my circuits on your petty affairs so frequently, I would have been able to transform myself into a tachyon funnel, and saved much tedious time-wasting, not to mention your offer to Egrorian, which I considered quite insulting. The ultimate computer in exchange for the ultimate weapon, indeed! Allowed time to complete my research, I could have been both."

"But..." began Avon.

"But as it was," continued Orac, "I had not progressed beyond a simple bullet-ejecting gadget."

"Like the one that just killed Blake," said Avon.

Servalan could not believe her luck. Blake dead. Avon alive. Orac capable of turning itself into anything she needed. She clutched convulsively at her stomach.

"Like the one that just killed Servalan," said Orac, following up the bullet with a spray that streamed from his nozzle and rendered all the Federation troops unconscious, while the butt of the gun suddenly converted into a gas mask which Avon put on. "That woman had no appreciation of my powers," Orac remarked. "She valued me at a mere hundred million credits. A derisory sum."

"But Blake..." Avon repeated.

"I fail to see why you keep pursuing this line of questioning," retaliated Orac. "I have explained that Blake had to die to fulfil my prediction. In any case, you do not like unsolved mysteries. You wanted to know the end of his story; now you have seen it. It is time for a new beginning."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"The success of the rebellion, of course!"

Avon looked round him. "You seem to have killed off all the rebels. Not to mention my crew."

"I had nothing to do with their deaths," insisted Orac. "If they chose to get caught in the crossfire between the Federation and Blake's people, that was entirely their responsibility."

"So why do you think the rebellion is suddenly going to succeed, when its best-known leader is dead?"

"For the first time, it will have a proper strategist directing it. Neither you nor Blake had the faintest idea of how to organise a revolution, so I have decided to lead the fight myself. The sooner I have overthrown the Federation, the sooner I can resume my researches undisturbed."

"And what do you know about military strategy... or revolutionary politics?" enquired Avon.

"Plenty. I have been studying the tactics of Caesar... Sun Tzu... von Klausewitz... Mao... Guevara... Willow... Samor... I can defeat the Federation in days, rather than weeks."

"Dayna always did say you had delusions of grandeur."

"Delusions?" exploded Orac. Avon ducked to avoid the falling debris, but found he still had most of the gun in his hand. "I was the only sane one among you. And the chances of my winning control of the galaxy have now risen to two hundred and eleven thousand two hundred and eighty-one to one. But first, it is imperative that we transport ourselves to safety with all due urgency."

"And how do you propose we do that, with Scorpio wrecked?"

"If I may continue... My researches have also enabled me to transform myself into a small but spaceworthy ship. Eventually, it should be possible to simulate the Liberator; for now, a planet-hopper will serve our needs."

"You could simulate the Liberator?" wailed Avon. "Couldn't you have mentioned this during the past year on Xenon?"

"Well now," mimicked Orac, "all you had to do was ask."


End file.
